


Alterations

by Lauren (notalwaysweak)



Category: Red Dwarf
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2002-07-03
Updated: 2002-07-03
Packaged: 2017-10-05 23:20:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,110
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/47139
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/notalwaysweak/pseuds/Lauren
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Do Not Alter, indeed. Rimmer and Kryten have grand plans to continue the human race, but kind of miss.</p><p>Dedicated to JB.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Alterations

**Author's Note:**

> Red Dwarf characters belong to Grant Naylor.

Lister met Rimmer in the corridor just by the airlock and tried to grab his arm. 'Rimmer, what you're planning is madness.'

'Why? I can get a real body this way. All I need to do is get the computer to replace my hologrammatic molecules with human ones. Holly says she can do it. Let me go, Lister, or you'll be in severe trouble,' Rimmer said, folding his arms and waiting for the mad human to get out of his way.

Lister blocked the open airlock entrance. 'Over my dead body. I'm not seeing you turned into a three-headed monster.'

Rimmer sighed. 'Look, Lister, I know you don't like me. But you're not going to deny me this chance at happiness.' With that he stepped through Lister, his light bee bobbing over Lister's head, and into the airlock, activating the light sensitive panel and closing the door.

'Just make sure you don't bugger it up, Holly,' Lister said to the monitor beside the door as he heard the outer airlock door open onto the UFO still attached to the backside of _Red Dwarf_ like an unsightly pimple.

'Look, I'll do my best, but no promises,' Holly said.

* * *

Rimmer stood alone in the high-roofed room, the coloured lights playing eerily around him. Holly was on the computer screen, watching him.

'Are you sure you want to do this, Arn?' she asked in a slightly worried voice.

'Make me human, Holly.'

'Transmogrification sequence initiated.' The pillar of purple light shimmered into place around the hologram, who stood stock-still, unwilling to move the tiniest bit, lest it disrupt the process.

'Gene sample accepted and cloned. Searching database...' A red light started flashing over the screen Holly was on.

'What's the light, Hol?'

'It's searching, making sure it can do what you want,' Holly said in her usual voice, then added in the gene computer's voice, 'New genetic structure accepted. Metamorphosis in ten seconds and counting...'

The bizarre feeling of being taken apart and put back together again hummed through Rimmer's body. It wasn't painful. In fact, it was almost pleasurable. When he was completely reconstructed and the light had stopped flowing around him, he heard Holly gasp.

'Your H is gone, Arn. You're human again.'

* * *

'It's been three days and we've gone through two weeks' food supplies already. Even with two extra mouths to feed, we shouldn't be using this much.' Lister, taking on the responsible role for once, glared at the two new humans, who sat in the officers' quarters, looking decidedly unrepentant.

'Who cares, Listy? There're a million ships out here to loot. We could transmogrify the Cat into a pork roast.' Rimmer split an orange in half, handed half to Kryten, and started sucking on a segment, savouring the sweet taste of the juice.

'He's right, Lister. Who needs to worry? There's plenty to go around.'

'You could always turn that crate of condoms into food,' the Cat said. 'Cloister knows we're not going to use them the way they are.'

'We could eat them anyway - they're flavoured.' Kryten held both hands up as Lister sighed and Rimmer started giggling. 'Alright, settle down!'

'You are _not_ taking this seriously enough, Kryten,' Lister said.

'Serious? Who cares?'

'Just because you're not a mechanoid any more... it's ludicrous. You've given up all your old ways!'

'What, you expected me to remain subservient, obedient, and docile?' Kryten made a rather rude noise with his lips. 'Come on, Rimsy, let's go for a drink.'

'_Rimsy_?'

'We're friends now. We're both human. We're not half-creatures any more.' Rimmer stuck his tongue out at Lister and followed Kryten out of the room.

'It's sodding ridiculous!' Lister picked up Rimmer's leftover orange and ate it, absentminded.

'Look, Bud, if ex-Goalpost-Head and ex-Novelty-Condom-Head want to lash out, let 'em,' the Cat said. 'They'll get over it. Want to watch the Flintstones?'

'Yeah, alright.'

* * *

Down in the Arcadia, a favourite bar of the minor late-teen-early-twenties section of the crew, Rimmer and Kryten were pouring each other drinks. Frequently. They had found something to commiserate about -- their mutual forced inferiority due to not being living, breathing humans.

And, as happens when large amounts of drink are involved, they started getting maudlin. And talking about how they'd never be able to have children. And all that.

'But... wait. We really real people now,' Rimmer said after about twenty minutes' thought. 'We _can_ have chi'rn. Got real... real... bits.'

'Can't have chi'rn wi'out woman,' Kryten said wisely. 'Gotta have woman have chi'rn.'

'Nah. Not on... _Dwarf_. Incoo- inkyoo- incubra- box thingy. In medi-bay. Get frozen eggs, fertilise 'em.' Rimmer made a rather obscene gesture with one hand to demonstrate exactly how one fertilised frozen ova. 'Then put in box thingy. Like freeze-dried food.'

Kryten thought about this for a long time. 'Yuck,' was his final verdict.

'Nah, nah!' Rimmer insisted. 'Chi'rn good, else where... where's ship gonna be, twenny-thirdy years' time?'

'Er... three mil'yn minus twenny-thirdy years fr'm Earth?' Kryten said, hazarding a guess.

'Nah, mean wi'out crew.'

'Oh.'

'So we gotta... gotta have chi'rn,' Rimmer said.

'Now?'

'Mi' as well...' Rimmer grabbed a bottle of whiskey for him and a bottle of vodka for Kryten, and the two of them went off to have babies.

* * *

The rather embarrassing underlying fact of the matter was, when they looked back on it (if they could bear to), that Kryten didn't know how to masturbate. Laughable, really... he'd been around humans for years, had all too often inadvertently seen something he shouldn't... but he couldn't figure it out for himself.

And so Rimmer had to help him.

And so he somehow ended up on his knees, his mouth hot around part of Kryten that hadn't even existed twenty-four hours ago.

Considering the use they'd planned to put the semen to, it was probably a waste when Rimmer swallowed.

It was probably even more of a waste when his own climax ended up spilling over inside Kryten.

They abandoned the baby project, and spent the rest of the night in bed together, the hospital bed's wheels squeaking back and forth on the floor until one of them figured out how to put the brakes on.

What the hell. It was more fun than figuring out how to thaw ova any day.

* * *

The next morning, Holly switched them back to their original states. Lister never asked, and Rimmer never told him, just why the hologram preferred to remain intangible, but Rimmer and Kryten both knew. It was just too easy to get drunk when you were human. And while you might forget for a little while what you were doing, you always remembered in the morning.


End file.
